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As part of engagement in the
Open Government Partnership, the US government is required to develop an OGP country plan with concrete
commitments on open government.The government makes public commitments to
both domestic and international audiences, accountability for those commitments
is built into the OGP process, and the government’s reputation is openly on the
line.

The first US plan was somewhat rushed and imperfect—the
administration’s commitments were sometimes vague, and how the commitments
connected to a broader image of government transparency wasn’t always clear.
The role of the non-profit community/civil society was a central component in
the implementation and evaluation of the 1st Plan (see the civil society evaluation here).

The ideas featured on this site represent an effort to magnify civil society’s engagement during the creation, as well as the implementation, of the second plan and strengthen the quality and comprehensiveness of the government’s commitment to openness.

To set high standards for the US government's second plan, civil society created its own. We invited civil society members to submit their own model commitments through this site, breaking down the big goals of openness into concrete steps that could be reasonably taken over a year's time. The submitted commitments are posted on this site, and were presented to the administration as a final document in August.